Monday, April 16, 2012

I've received an exciting update to this post I first put up earlier this month. I was told today that Charles Portis is a long-ago former colleague of my newspaper's former managing editor and was best man at his wedding. More to the point, this former managing editor brought the Inquirer's copy desks into the modern age, converting them from pre-retirement way stations for burned-out reporters into a unit with clearly defined roles and responsibilities. Did my ex-M.E. get his interest in copy editors from Portis? Did Portis learn to respect copy editors from my ex-M.E.? Or did they imbibe together from a wellspring of respect for copy desks that runs deep beneath the Arkansas soil?

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I first heard of Charles Portis' 1979 novel The Dog of the South from a Detectives Beyond Borders reader who thought I might be interested because the book's protagonist is a newspaper copy editor who has recently quit his job.

Here's the paragraph that persuaded me to buy the book:

"I had sat next to Dupree on the rim of the copy desk. In fact, I had gotten him the job. He was not well liked in the newsroom. He radiated dense waves of hatred and he never joined in the friendly banter around the desk, he who had once been so lively. He hardly spoke at all except to mutter `Crap' or `What crap' as he processed news matter, affecting a contempt for all events on earth and for the written accounts of those events."

Now, what the hell does Charles Portis know about newspapers? Why would a copy editor complain, especially about the news matter he processed? That sort of thing can only foster disunity in the newsroom.

Sorry to hear the book's association with a bookstore's demise. I don't know yet how much crime there is in the book, though the cross-country pursuit is the stuff of lots of crime stories. I bought the book because of the delicious association with my beleaguered profession.

Seana, the only warning sign I can see in my browsing of Portis has been that the joking might prove a bit relentless for some readers. But there's something somehow understated and even sweet about the joking. I have a feeling he won't go over the top.

The protagonist is not the copy editor who sat around complaining that everything was crap. But either possibility is bizarre: that a copy editor would grouse or quit.

But just to see an author use the word "rim" in connection with copy desk is a pleasant surprise. (The rim is where I work.) I'm surprised by such a rare mention because, for all the former frequency of newspapers as a former subject of American movies and popular fiction, copy desks are about as little acknowledged by moviemakers and authors as they are in real newsrooms.

"Portis began writing in college, for both the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville student newspaper, Arkansas Traveler, and the Northwest Arkansas Times. One of his tasks was to redact the colorful reporting of "lady stringers" in the Ozarks, a task credited as a source for the vivid voice which he created years later for his character Mattie Ross in True Grit.[3] After Portis graduated, he worked for various newspapers as a reporter, including almost two years at the Arkansas Gazette, for which he wrote the "Our Town" column.He moved to New York, where he worked for four years at the New York Herald Tribune. His work led him to return to the South frequently to cover civil rights–related stories during the early 1960s. After serving as the London bureau chief of the New York Herald Tribune, he left journalism in 1964."

Come to think of it, Portis is a former reporter who imagines himself into the role of a former copy editor in The Dog of the South. I don't know if the occupations of either author of protagonist will play any role in the novel, but Portis' choice would surprise the occupants of any newsroom, especially those on the copy desk.

The history of copy editing is interesting, at least to copy editors. At my newspaper. the copy desks used to be manned by burned-out reporters. Not until the 1970s did copy desks begin to be staffed by people interested in copy editing. In retrospect, copy editors and copy editing had a very short history in Philadelphia.

My favorite Portis sentence ever, from DOG OF THE SOUTH: "In Laredo I got a six-dollar motel room that had a lot of posted rules on the door and one rubber pillow on the bed and an oil-burning heater in the wall that had left many a salesman groggy."

I think the issue with MASTERS is, unlike his other novels, the perspective drifts so much between characters that it doesn't have the narrative single-mindedness or focus the others do. Some great stuff in there though.

Wallace, Portis' sentences remind me of the celebrated opening of "The Last Good Kiss," a sentence I have always thought went over the top. But to my eyes, Portis' sentences do not go so far, do not so insistently demand admiration of their own cleverness.

You're an ex-newspaperman; does Midge's profession figure prominently in the book?

Good luck. I'd hoped that by 2012 things would have stabilized somewhat in the biz, but it seems like there's been a new round of buyouts and layoffs at some major papers just this week, esp. via Gannett.

Thanks. I think it's time we resign ourselves to the fact that not many of this country's remaining newspapers will consistently reward the effort it takes to read them, and the New York Times is doing its best to cede its place on that short list.

I don't always like yuk-it-up, 1960's-influenced, over-the-top humor, but that line captures very nicely what I think I'll like about Portis. It comes close to going over the top, but the acute observation salvages it. He's like John McPhee-meets-George-Carlin.

Well, I don't drive, I have a short commute, and I spend little time at the beach, so I have few opportunities to listen to audio books. But I'll keep her in mind, and also that guy Doyle who you say does such a good job with yours.

That line went completely over my head. I thought the rim of the copy desk was the edge of the copy desk. Whatever the hell a copy desk is. Rim editors? What bizarre terminology.

I'm afraid I'd never make a copy editor. Yesterday my 92 year old mother, who has no short-term memory at all, got a card from her 12 year old great-granddaughter, who is currently living in Australia, which included the phrase 'time flys'.

I read it before my mother did and noticed nothing at all wrong about it. When she read it, the first thing she mentioned was the spelling of 'flys'.

In my own defense, I might say it's one thing knowing the 'rules'. It's another thing recognizing when the 'rules' have been broken. Not much of a defense, I'll admit. A good night's sleep must be a prerequsite to doing the job well. I'll have to work on that.

No reason for you to know what a copy-desk rim is. I, on the other hand, got a great kick out of the reference, the first I had ever seen to my job in fiction. In fact, the rim was once exactly what you guessed: the edge of the copy desk. In the old days, copy editors would sit around the edge, or rim, of a horseshoe-shaped table. The head of the copy desk would sit at the apex of the horseshoe, where a notch, or slot, was cut from the table so he or she could be closer to the action and more easily hand the stories to the copy editors. Seating arrangements and technology have changed, but the terminology has survived. Copy editors who edit stories and write headlines are still said to work on the rim, and the editors who distribute the work are still called slots.

In re rules and breaking them, the key is to know the rules well and to have a good enough ear to know when breaking the rules works. Too many writers do not.

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About Me

This blog is a proud winner of the 2009 Spinetingler Award for special services to the industry and its blogkeeper a proud former guest on Wisconsin Public Radio's Here on Earth. In civilian life I'm a copy editor in Philadelphia. When not reading crime fiction, I like to read history. When doing neither, I like to travel. When doing none of the above, I like listening to music or playing it, the latter rarely and badly.
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